Alison Berkley Just Joined The Male-Dominated Venture Capital Worldhttp://www.businessinsider.com/alison-berkley-joined-the-vc-boys-club-2013-3/comments
en-usWed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 -0500Fri, 09 Dec 2016 10:45:07 -0500Julie Borthttp://www.businessinsider.com/c/5148725cecad04cd7b000002jamesxxxxxxxxTue, 19 Mar 2013 10:12:44 -0400http://www.businessinsider.com/c/5148725cecad04cd7b000002
The reason there are very few female VCs is the same reason there are no women winning the Daytona 500.
a) the best VC's come from the trenches: only 15% women with tech degrees, very few of them go on to do tech, there are few women in basements working on cool stuff. Women in the Valley are in marketing, PR, tech journalism and other fluff.
b) consequently - there are very few women entrepreneurs in tech as as whole.
c) consequently, there are very few women with exposure to venture capital - it usually takes a good 10 years in the industry to get a strong idea of how they work. There are very few women with strong networks in this area.
Julie - you should do an article on why women think they deserve 50% of the leadership positions and 50% of the positions of influence in organizations wherein they do not want to do the 'hard work' in the trenches, which develops their natural abilities and instincts, and enables them to be better investors?
Because I would argue that it's unfair frankly - moreover - if women actually did a, b and c - you would find they would naturally start taking up roles at VC firms and nobody would have any issue with it at all.
The premise of this post-feminism era, which is fundamentally flawed, is the assumption that if there isn't a lot of women doing something, that it's somehow 'the systems' fault, when I would argue the very first question that must be asked are 'why are women performing so poorly'?
VC is a very, very aggressive business. You either have 'top dogs' or you fail. There is no room for schlep in VC. Kleiner Perkins used to be *the* VC shop in the Valley - built by 'old white men'. Then they decided to get progressive. The went for gender balance and ethnic balance. Guess what? They are in the tubes. They haven't done an important early deal in 10 years. They are living off of their brand - and it's the only thing getting them into later stage deals to make any money. Having 'progressive' hiring policies would be about as successful at VC as it would for a hockey team - death.
So, if we want more women in VC, the answer is: more women trying to change the world, more women founders, more women technical degrees, more women dreaming big, more women risking everything trying to change the world, more women putting their entire lives on hold for some cause, more women in the lab, more women writing code, more women living the life that it takes to be VC. Then - there will be a lot more gender balance in VC.